A course syllabus as a compulsory document has been recently introduced into Ukrainian university practice. Its structure, content, and volume vary from one educational establishment to another reflecting their overall vision of its role in the educational process. In general, the syllabus should provide a brief representation of the course aims, its training and assessment policy as well as an insight into the covered aspects, activities and reference materials involved. Syllabus quality appears to be crucial for the prospective translators training efficiency, since their professionally oriented courses stipulate the use of different sources and practical assignments to be submitted within the set deadlines. Our research was aimed at the investigation of subjective translation teachers’ and students’ attitude to syllabus role and functions in translation training as well as at the objective analysis of translation course syllabi available on the websites of 18 Ukrainian universities. According to the received results, all the categories of the respondents are not satisfied with the syllabi quality. The conducted analysis of the translation course syllabi allowed us to define their main features. Having summed up the findings of both employed research methods we managed to list potential functions of a powerful translation course syllabus.